C is still faster at common tasks and back then, code from readily available C and Pascal compilers was much faster than CMUCL or ELISP (both had a bytecode int

C is still faster at common tasks and back then, code from readily available C and Pascal compilers was much faster than CMUCL or ELISP (both had a bytecode interpreter only AFAIR). My point is that in the 80s and 90s, computers were much slower and a factor of 2 was a big deal then, especially for professional developers who had to write well-performing applications, though nowdays a good language is "fast enough" if it's only half as fast as C.